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Persichilli: Can Ford survive now that Miller’s gone?

Last Sunday I was driving along St. Clair Avenue in Toronto. Although only a few cars were around, a traffic jam forced me to go north on Eglinton Avenue to proceed faster toward the West End.

A major Toronto street, wider than a Pearson Airport landing strip, was reduced to one lane in both directions while in the middle there were empty TTC tracks!

This reminded me of one of the hundreds of irritating initiatives undertaken by David Miller’s administration that ignored common sense and, most of all, the will of the majority of the citizens of Toronto.

I felt better when my daughter, that same night, told me that Miller was the only personality who was violently booed during the presentation of the MLS Cup at BMO field.

This preamble is necessary to talk about Rob Ford, the former councillor who this Wednesday will become the 64th mayor of Toronto.

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Who is Rob Ford? Despite a long and hard-fought campaign, I don’t believe that either supporters or detractors really know him.

I don’t agree with the violent negative stories about Ford that appeared during the campaign and the character assassination perpetrated against the former councillor.

At the same time, I don’t agree with those who write about the “Ford phenomenon,” the “perfect campaign” and the “sleek campaigner” who was able to engineer a “brilliant campaign” to outmanoeuvre his opponents.

All Ford had to do was stand still and keep doing exactly what he had been for the past 10 years on council: count beans and attack waste.

The masterminds of his campaign were his opponents, who outmanoeuvred themselves by driving head on into irrelevance, and by David Miller, who invited Torontonians to vote against him every time they drove along St. Clair, when they hit a speed bump (even while driving in their driveways), when they paid taxes or renewed a licence plate.

Praising Ford for the good campaign he ran is like congratulating the weatherman for a sunny day. Ford was like a hunter that found himself, by coincidence, right in the middle of pack of drunken rabbits — and he didn’t miss a shot.

Those who want to transport Ford’s campaign into other areas will have to make sure they take along David Miller and the other candidates who defeated themselves.

It is in this context that Torontonians on Wednesday will ask themselves the billion-dollar question: Is Ford going to be a good mayor?

I don’t agree with his detractors who say he is going to be a disaster. On the other hand, the blame Miller game is over and beginning Wednesday the real show starring Rob Ford gets underway.

For now, he has shown good judgment by surrounding himself with good people, and the choice of Case Ootes to lead the transition team was wise. He is reaching out to his opponents mindful of the fact that “you keep your friends close, but your enemies closer.”

I hope people will give him time to address the huge problems Toronto is facing, but the frustration that elected him has now morphed into expectations, and any wise strategist knows there is nothing deadlier for a politician than managing high expectations.

And while he can blame Miller for the current sense of frustration, he can only blame himself for creating high expectations. He made people believe that it is going to be easy to erase Miller’s policies. “Tax and spend” policies can be good or bad, as can “cut and cut.” It all depends on how you do it.

From Wednesday on, Ford will no longer have the best assets of his new political life: Miller, his naive opponents and the weekly John Oakley Show.

From now on, it’s just going to be him and the frustrated Toronto voters with high expectations. In between, there are the traffic jams on St. Clair, the speed bumps all over the city, high taxes, the unions, spending cuts, the slashing of (useless?) social services.

I hope he can manage the 43 councillors like he did his football team. Good luck Rob: It’s your show now!

Angelo Persichilli is the political editor of Corriere Canadese. His column appears Sunday.

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